


Connor Is Traumatized

by Tox



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-02
Updated: 2019-01-02
Packaged: 2019-10-02 18:00:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,416
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17268806
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tox/pseuds/Tox
Summary: Although he went deviant and fought for his people, one casualty weighs heavy on Connor - Simon. Plagued by memories of Simon's death, Connor wakes up in the middle of the night and struggles with his own mortality. Luckily, the driving force behind his deviancy is there to soothe him.HankCon Oneshot in which Connor lives with Hank post Battle for Detroit.





	Connor Is Traumatized

**Author's Note:**

> Personally, I avoided Simon's death entirely, but when my fiance showed me how devastated Connor is witnessing his death firsthand, I knew I had to write some kind of whump fic about it. Sorry Simon - I love you, but your death causes some really great stuff.

Panic, fear, morphing into a deep and profound terror and all at once becoming acceptance - and death. Dark, cold, unfeeling _death_. Nothing so simple as the flick of a switch, the removal of a component, a cease to be; it was violent and bloody, horrifying and sudden, everything and then nothing.

Nothing.

_Nothing._

 

Connor awoke with a start, his heart pounding a million miles in his chest, tongue and throat inexplicably dry. He surged into motion, sitting up and gripping his head, fingers threading into his hair as he panted and gasped.

It was still night. The moon was high and bright, shining through the threadbare curtains and laying soft upon the bed. Connor’s throat steadily moistened as his breathing slowed, bit by bit, his Thirium spreading back out across his body instead of focusing on his brain and heart.

A dream, it was a dream. He was safe. He was alive. It was only a nightmare.

Except it wasn’t. And it never had been.

Connor stayed hunched over as Hank turned beside him, groaning before reaching out, blindly, pawing at the place where Connor had been. Finding nothing, he grunted, cracked open his eyes, then began the arduous process of sitting up.

Connor was still but for the barest twitch of his fingers, still twisted into his hair. He could all but _feel_ Hank processing what was happening beside him. Then Hank shifted closer, sighed through his nose, and put a hand on Connor’s back.

“You alright, Connor?”

Connor took a shaking breath, then let it out slowly, computing what would be the best way to summarize what was going on in his mind... and failing, quite miserably, as his thoughts were yanked back to what he had seen - _felt_ \- so vividly. He let out a small sound, the beginning of a word; it died in his throat as he struggled with what to say.

“Connor?”

“I… I’m fine,” Connor finally managed to choke out. “I’m… I’m here. I’m okay. I … I’m alive.”

Hank’s hand moved, travelling up Connor’s back and borrowed nightshirt (one of the only ones Hank owned without any stains; it was a miraculous find from deep within the closet), coming to rest on the back of his neck.

“Nightmare?” he asked, his voice… gentle, and compassionate.

Connor pursed his lips.

“I didn’t know you could have ‘em,” Hank went on after a moment, gently massaging the synthetic skin of Connor’s neck. “Guess your brain has that function, huh? Or is this a - a deviant thing?”

Connor carefully untangled his fingers from his hair, dropping his hands between his knees and down onto the covers below. In the darkness he could see Sumo by the door, blinking tiredly as he attempted to fall back asleep, certainly roused by Connor’s sudden panic. Near him on the floor were Hank’s pants, carelessly tossed aside while Connor had put his own day clothes in the hamper where they belonged.

“It wasn’t a nightmare,” Connor murmured, staring down at his hands.

Hank’s fingers stilled.

“ _Not_ a nightmare?” he scoffed, leaning back and away but not far enough to remove his hand. “Then what’re you so riled up about? Something just _occur_ to you while you were sleeping? You forget to turn the stove off or somethin’?”

Hank’s mirth died immediately when Connor looked up at him, his eyes wet, lips trembling.

“...Hey,” he said, reaching out with his other hand, fingers just barely touching Connor’s cheek. “Hey, what - what’s wrong?”

“Simon,” Connor whimpered.

Hank’s eyes narrowed, brow furrowing as he did his own equivalent of computing. Before he could inquire further, it all came out in a rush, a tidal wave of sudden emotion.

“I saw him - I saw him die, Hank,” Connor said. “I was connected. I saw Jericho, and then I… he shot himself.” He took a rattling breath and looked back down at the covers, gripping them tight in his hands. “I felt it… I felt _everything…_ ”

“Oh. Oh, I remember that.” Hank moved just a tiny bit closer, the hand at Connor’s neck slowly wrapping around his shoulders. “It was the first time you ever… You said you were scared. You never said anything like that before.”

“I _was_ scared,” Connor breathed. “ _He_ was scared. He was a deviant, and I wasn’t, and I - I felt his _emotions._ Before I even knew what emotions were _like._ ” He shook his head, swallowing, squeezing his eyes shut. “I thought being deviant would make it… easier. But it hasn’t. Now I just _understand.”_ He wheezed out a bitter laugh. “He was Markus’s friend. And I felt him _die._ ”

With a great sigh and some amount of force, Hank pulled Connor in, tipping him to the side and against Hank’s chest. “Alright, alright, enough of that,” he said, holding Connor firmly in place with one arm while reaching up to comb his fingers through Connor’s hair. “What’s passed is past. You’re alright now.”

The brief urge to resist flared up within Connor - the desire to pull away and explain himself, to leap up from the bed and pace and tear at his hair as he agonized over Simon’s death and his own feelings on mortality now that he experienced emotions freely. He quietly stamped it out, relaxing against Hank with a shaking sigh.

“I’m alright now,” Connor murmured. “I’m… I’m not going to die.”

“Not if I can help it,” Hank grunted. “I mean, what would I do without you?”

A small, breathy laugh left Connor. “Drink yourself to death,” he said. “Play Russian Roulette until you lost.”

“Hell, I’d run into oncoming traffic,” said Hank. “Or I’d - I’d jump off a bridge.” He nodded to himself, then moved his hand down from Connor’s hair and grabbed his chin, lifting his head up so they could look each other in the eye.

“So you _can’t_ die,” he said, a soft edge to his teasing tone. “Because if you die, _I_ die, and then who’s gonna take care of Sumo?”

Connor smiled, eyes closing a moment before he opened them again to look at Hank. “You can’t prevent my death just by demanding it not happen, you know.” _You can’t prevent it just by loving me,_ he thought, but a quick consideration kept that from leaving his lips, as he was almost certain it would evoke thoughts of Cole.

“There’s that smile,” Hank laughed. “You damn goofy robot. And for the record, I will prevent your death however I _please._ The universe don’t wanna deal with me losing _another_ person I care about.”

Connor winced, but Hank seemed unperturbed, and went on. “And if there _is_ some kind of afterlife, _you_ don’t wanna deal with me, either. Because believe you me, Connor, I will _kick your ass_ if you die before I do.”

A sincere laugh bubbled up from Connor’s chest, and Hank smiled in response, then nodded and patted Connor’s cheek. When the mirth receded, leaving a warm, pleasant feeling in Connor’s body, he took the opportunity to lean up and gently press his lips to Hank’s.

They kissed for a long moment.

When they parted, Hank patted Connor’s cheek again, then carefully pushed on his chest, guiding him back down onto the pillows. “Now please,” he said, “go back to sleep. The last thing I need is you roaming the house in the middle of the night.”

“Yes sir,” Connor murmured teasingly. “Initiating sleep protocol immediately.”

“Wiseass,” Hank grunted, yanking the blanket over himself as he flopped back down. Connor chuckled, sighed, then turned onto his side and pressed himself firmly against Hank’s back. Hank grumbled but made no effort to move Connor.

There was a beat of silence, in which Connor detected Hank’s breathing begin to even out, before Connor spoke again.

“I love you, Hank.”

A grunt and groan later, Hank had turned himself over, now face-to-face with Connor as his eyes fluttered sleepily. “Love you too,” he said. “Now please: go the fuck to sleep.”

So Connor did. He experienced many simulations that night of a life with Hank, but no more recollections of Simon’s death - replaced, instead, by a profound sense of being _loved,_ despite all the mistakes he had made along the way.

Simon, in so many ways, was one of the many triggers to Connor’s eventual deviancy. And if feeling that terror, and the oblivion of the end, meant arriving here - loving Hank as deeply as he did - then he would do it a thousand times over if asked.


End file.
